---
title: "Limits of the farming analogy for AI"
date: 2026-02-03
canonical: https://solmaz.io/x/2018821607414808841/
x_url: https://x.com/onusoz/status/2018821607414808841
license: CC BY 4.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/)
---

People like the farmer analogy for AI

Like before tractors and industrial revolution 80% of the population had to farm. Once they came all those jobs disappeared

So analogy makes perfect sense. Instead of 30 people tending a field, you just need 1. Instead of 30 software developers, you just need one

Except that people forget one crucial thing about land: it's a limited resource

Unlike land, digital space is vast and infinite. Software can expand and multiply in it in arbitrarily complex ways

If you wanted the farming analogy to keep up with this, you would have to imagine us creating contintent-sized hydroponic terraces up until the stratosphere, and beyond...

*Part 1/2 of a thread; root: https://solmaz.io/x/2018821607414808841/*